The Ride to the Abyss

This DVD of a live 2005 performance from the Zürich Opera under the musical direction of Franz Welser-Möst has many things to recommend it -- the young tenor Piotr Beczala as Alfredo, the marvelous Thomas Hampson as Giorgio Germont, the playing of the Zurich Opera orchestra, the simple but effective sets by by Erich Wonder, the uncluttered stage direction by Jürgen Flimm. It also has some flaws: strangely variable volume level of the recorded sound sometimes coming on so loud as to make one reach for the volume control, and the uneven performance of the Violetta, Eva Mei who, for all her merits, gives a dramatically effective performance marred by occasional difficulties with vocal production. Still, overall I felt this was a moving production, one that I would recommend, although perhaps not as an only DVD of one of Verdi's most popular operas.

The Hedgehog and the Bear decide to wipe the dust off the stars so their brightness won't fade out.

A little crane flies to Africa with other cranes. He likes it there very much, but later he realizes that he is only a stranger there and returns home.

A lion cub lives on a distant island, in which his friend, a monkey, is sick. In order to cure the ailment, the lion cub covered the monkey with leaves and gave him a coconut milk, heated on the fire. But the wise parrot advised a miraculous way - linden tea, which has a magnificent golden hue. But where, among the palm trees, take the linden-tree?

A comedic story. One day a man had a toothache. He did everything to reduce his suffering, but nothing helped. He went to the clinic, where there were many same sufferers like himself. However, the instrument sounds wafting from the dental office forced him to flee. He will have an adventure as a result of the realization that dentists can easily help, and there should be no fear to them.

The animation is based on a Ukrainian fairy tale about an old married couple, who had no children. One day the woman asked her husband to cut down a log and put it in a cradle for a night. The old man did what she had asked him to do. Next morning, a surprise was waiting for them.

This cartoon is based on a humorous Ukrainian folk song about how wives decided to sell their disgraced husbands. One wife wants to get rid of the reveler, the other - from the drunkard, the young woman is tired of the old man, the worker is lazy, and the tall - the husband is too small in stature.

A Cossack wandered in search of a better life, and his lifelong dream was a fast and beautiful horse. He had to meet him on the way a fortune-teller and a swamp waterman, which traded a horseshoe to a bunch of red peppers with the Cossack; and he had to beat the devil in cards and eventually find peace of mind in the family life with a beautiful Ukrainian girl.

A cat and a dog lived together. They were very good friends, so when they saw that the floor in their house was dirty, they decided to clean up together. But an ordinary mop refused to deal with the task, so they have to wash and wipe the floor using each other. What will this novel idea lead to?

The dragon Horynych attacks ordinary Ukrainian village residents. He takes young men and women, leaving only senior villagers. But a young boy named Kotyhoroshko decides to confront the dreadful Dragon. First, he needs to get appropriate weapons and call his friends warriors…

A tale about how Donkey came to visit Goat and they went skiing together.

There was an island inhabited by turtles. Their king above all else loved all kinds of praise and flattery, so subjects always followed them trying to play along to him. One day he decided to climb very high, using a very unstable structure.

Basilio, a circus cat, is a real troublemaker. He causes a lot of trouble for his owner, a young trainer named Masha. But the girl is helped by a cheerful and clever little mouse named Pik...

About a wolf who gate crashes a wedding. Based on a Belorusian folk tale, although the decay of the Soviet Union at the time show through the pores of the depiction of the tale.

The story is about a puppy named Bob, who loved to listen to music, turning on the tape recorder at full volume. All the forest inhabitants’ ears were already ringing from Bob’s music, and the bluebells had even withered. And then the puppy’s friends decided to teach Bob a lesson.

A fairy tale about how the little hunter Nikita and the puppy Bobik helped Zubrenok find his mother.

On Your Mark!

For the past ten years Zappa in composing has turned away from Rock and Roll music - for which he first became famous - and has been working on new, contemporary, orchestral electronic music; in solitude and beyond any commercial conventions or commitments. It is the first time that Zappa has allowed a film crew to study him during compositional work, actually filming the first moments of a new compositional process. By contrast, in a staged interview Zappa gives comments on music. This film seeks to reveal the sensetivities of Zappa's personality and character also beyond narrative content.

A young boy who likes to play the flute dreams that he has lost his water buffalo.

A mother and son are eating sushi at a conveyer belt sushi bar in Tokyo. This film depicts their conversation using cutout animation.